BROAD CREEK – East Duplin is in a position to win the East Central 2-A Conference soccer title.

Credit that to sophomore Adams Canales, who scored with 16.5 seconds left in the first 10-minute overtime to lift East Duplin past Croatan 1-0 in a match featuring the league’s top two teams.

The Panthers (13-3-1, 7-0) can clinch the ECC’s top seed for the NCHSAA 2-A playoffs with a victory at Northside tonight. An additional win would then secure the conference title outright for East Duplin, ranked eighth in the N.C. Soccer Coaches Association 2-A poll.

The Cougars (11-5, 5-2) were hoping to defeat the Panthers and create a first-place tie with East Duplin with three league remaining league games. Croatan lost 5-2 at East Duplin on Sept. 30 after leading 2-0 at halftime.

“This was a wonderful effort on our part,” Croatan coach Paul Slater said. “The guys came in and did everything we asked of them.”

But East Duplin won this match, thanks to Canales’ goal.

Standing inside the 18-yard box, Canales played a crossing pass from the right side by junior Ian Wickline. Canales then took a step to his left and fired a shot into the left part of the goal.

“I was about to be offside because I kept closing on the defense,” Canales said. “I just stood there for a little bit, I called for the ball, just took a step and shot.”

It was Canales’ 11th goal on the season.

“We are always trying to get Adams free,” Jones said. “He’s been hot for us, especially in the last several weeks. We are trying to find him and we are lucky that we did find him tonight.”

And what did Slater think of the goal?

“They played it through, he cuts it back and it goes in,” he said. “We changed our formation because we wanted to win and didn’t want a tie and so the game became much more open in the last 10 minutes and in the two overtimes when we changed it.”

Croatan wasn’t able to do much with the ball in the ensuing moments following Canales’ goal since it happened so late in the first overtime.

The Cougars also weren’t able to muster a shot on goal in the second overtime, and they played down a man in the final 2:28 after Gunner Tolston received a red card.

“Croatan is a hard team,” Canales said. “We went more defensive.”

Both teams ended with four shots on goal with most of them coming from outside the 18 and each shot being saved by goalkeepers, Zach Tracy of Croatan and Diego Avila of East Duplin.

The Cougars’ best chance came seven minutes into the second half when they had an open shot from point-blank range go over the goal.

“We were a little unlucky not to score there early in the second half,” Slater said. “We score that and it changes the game because it would allow us to sit back a little bit more.”

The two squads traded spurts of controlling ball possession.

“We knew we were coming in for a battle,” Jones said. “Not much separated us. Both teams put in a lot of heart and played hard. We are happy to get the win.”

Canales said the Panthers were focused on limiting Croatan leading scorer, Garrett Bridgewater, who entered with 14 goals.

“He has a good left foot and coach told us to mark him at all times because he’s the key,” Canales said. “They (EDHS defenders) busted their tails tonight.”

And now the Panthers are closer toward an ECC title.

“It feels good,” Canales said. “We got three more games and we are just looking to win them.”